Family to resettle elderly man
Children of abandoned senior will decide on best way to care for him
jedesilva@thestar.com.my
From our interactions with Tang, we don’t find him mentally challenged. Perhaps he just needs someone patient to take care of him.
Aini (neighbour)
KUANTAN: The children of the 77-year-old man who was rescued from his locked home are finding a way to deal with the situation involving their father whom neighbours have described as a loving dad.
A police report lodged after the partially paralysed Tang Ngat, a widower with a daughter and two sons, was freed from his faeces-littered home in Taman Seri Inderapura here, has also been withdrawn as his family tries to resettle him.
A long-time neighbour who wanted to be known only as Aini said Tang was active and healthy and would walk to the market and do gardening before suffering a stroke several years ago.
“Sometimes I would bring food over to him and he’d insist on paying me RM4 or RM5,” said the 47-year-old housewife.
She said Tang was a loving father to his three children.
“He would look up his son in Selangor, and when his children came to visit, he would cook chicken or fish for them,” she said, adding that on Tuesday she had heard Tang calling for help.
“We tried our best to help feed and clean him through the locked grille,” said Aini, who later contacted Teruntum assemblyman Sim Chon Siang.
“From our interactions with Tang, we don’t find him mentally challenged. Perhaps he just needs someone patient to take care of him.”
Another neighbour, technician Amran Uda, 59, said he empathised with Tang.
“I too suffered a stroke before. When that happens to you, sometimes you lose your dignity as you need care from other people, and it upsets you and makes you push others away.”
On Wednesday, after being alerted by neighbours, the police and Fire and Rescue Department personnel went to Tang’s house where they cut the grille to reach him. He was found naked and alone with the place strewn with his faeces.
He was said to have been left by himself since Monday.
Sim, who withdrew the police report he had filed on Wednesday, said he would let the family find a way to take care of their father.
“It’s complicated and I think it’s best that the family handles it.
“Now Tang is in hospital. We will see what the doctors say,” he said.
Sim also said that Tang’s children had met him on Thursday.
“They were remorseful over their actions,” he added.
According to the children, Tang started behaving funny three months ago, not wanting to wear any clothes and having problems defecating, said Sim.
“Two months ago, the eldest son took Tang back to Klang but couldn’t handle him after two weeks. He then tried to send him to an old folks home but the home did not take him in due to his prickly behaviour,” he said.
The Kuantan District Social Welfare Office (PKMD) has expressed a wish to meet with the family.
Pahang Women and Family Development, Communications and Multimedia Committee chairman Datuk Shahaniza Shamsuddin said PKMD had suggested placing Tang at the Rumah Ehsan old folks home.
She said checks showed that Tang had refused to take up an offer to be placed at the Social Welfare Department Institute.
Shahaniza added that Tang had been receiving RM300 in monthly aid from the Welfare Department since 2013.